Mesha מֵישַׁע

Who is Mesha in the Bible?

Mesha was the king of Moab who rebelled against Israel after King Ahab's death, as recorded in 2 Kings 3:4. Originally, Mesha had paid tribute to the Israelite kings, supplying them with a hundred thousand lambs and the wool of a hundred thousand rams annually. When Jehoram became king of Israel, he formed an alliance with Jehoshaphat of Judah and the king of Edom to crush Mesha's rebellion. During the ensuing battle, as the Moabites faced defeat, Mesha performed a shocking act of desperation by sacrificing his own firstborn son as a burnt offering on the city wall, an action that provoked such revulsion that the Israelite forces withdrew from Moab. Mesha's story illustrates both the political instability of the ancient Near East and the lengths to which desperate rulers would go in times of crisis.